Backup & Restore
Configuration > Backup & Restore downloads a single file covering your configuration database and your whole ESPHome config directory - drop it into another Athena install to restore it to exactly the state it was in.
What's included
Dashboards, automations, connected devices, Locations & Areas, users, and settings, plus every file in the ESPHome config directory. Not included: entity state history and other telemetry (this is a configuration backup, not a data warehouse dump), and anything ephemeral like active sessions - those get rebuilt fresh on the other end regardless.
Restoring
Restoring replaces the current configuration and database entirely, and signs everyone out. There's no undo beyond restoring a different (or the same) backup again.
Upload a backup file from this or another Athena install. Once it's done, you're signed out along with everyone else who was logged in - the restored data includes its own user accounts, so log back in with whichever one the backup had.
No client tooling needed
Athena builds and restores the archive itself - there's no separate database client to install or run, and nothing to configure beyond clicking the button.
This is for moving configuration between installs. Switching this install between MariaDB and PostgreSQL is a different, live-switch action - see "Migrate to a different database" under Settings.